Chinese Empire Reform Association

Seen to the right in this photo from 1959 is Chinatown’s fifth theatre, built in 1885. The theatre was a brick building located between Cormorant Street (now Pandora Avenue) and Fisgard Street. It was here that Kang Youwei and leaders of Chinatowns in Victoria, Vancouver and New Westminster founded the Chinese Empire Reform Association (CERA), which later developed branches in nearly 200 cities in the Americas, Asia, Australia and Africa. Many scholars have misidentified the building at 1715 Government Street as the birthplace of the CERA, but that building was not erected as the headquarters of this reformist organization until 1905. In the 1930s, the Chinese Theatre was converted into an auto-body shop, and it was later used as a warehouse for Buckerfields before being demolished in 1987 (City of Victoria Archives, M01427, 1959).

The First Worldwide Chinese Political Association

A century ago, Chinese residents of Victoria played a key role in the international movement to reform the Chinese Empire. The first Chinese Empire Reform Association was formed in Victoria in 1899 by Kang Youwei, a political refugee who escaped a death sentence in China after he supported the Guangxu Emperor’s short-lived reforms aimed at modernizing Chinese political, economic, military and educational systems.

The need for reforms stemmed from China’s weakened position in the nineteenth century as it faced threats from Western and Japanese imperialism. During the Industrial Revolution, the West developed new weapons and forms of transportation, such as the steamship, using these to force entry into China and gain control over territories on China’s periphery. Adopting Western military technology, Japan also challenged China’s dominance. Britain, France and Japan made China sign a series of unequal treaties.

This is one of the two posters that show the leaders of the Chinese Empire Reform Association (CERA) in Victoria around 1903. This poster was printed in 1902 but published in the British Colonist on May 10, 1903. The Chinese title of this reformist organization was the Society to Protect the Emperor, and the picture of the Guangxu Emperor is at the top of the poster. He led the movement for political reform in China in mid-1898 but became a political prisoner after the reform was suppressed by the conservative faction. Two major participants in the 1898 Reform, Kang Youwei and Liang Qichao, appear on the right and left sides of the Guangxu Emperor in the poster because they were major founders and leaders of the CERA. The twenty-seven pictures in the lower part of the poster are those of local leaders and members of the CERA in Victoria around 1902 (British Colonist, 10 May 1903, 9).

There were different ideas in China about how to respond to these threats. Conservative factions recommended rejecting Western influences. Reformers advocated adopting those Western ideas and technologies that could be useful to China. In 1898, the twenty-seven-year-old Guangxu Emperor was convinced by leading reformers such as Kang Youwei and Liang Qichao to modernize the education system, create institutions to study Western industries, and build warships that could resist Western navies. Guangxu’s aunt, the Empress Dowager Cixi, was opposed to these dramatic measures and she carried out a coup d’etat just 100 days after the reforms were announced, placing the Emperor under house arrest. Kang Youwei and Liang Qichau managed to flee China, but six other leading reformers were executed in Beijing by conservative supporters of the empress dowager.

Kang Youwei arrived in Victoria via Japan in April 1899. He hoped to raise support from American and British governments to restore the Guangxu Emperor and the reformist movement, but he was barred from entering the United States due to the Chinese Exclusion Act and he received little assistance from the British government. He was, however, warmly received by Chinese communities in Victoria, Vancouver, and New Westminster. With the leaders of these communities, Kang founded the Chinese Empire Reform Association (CERA) in Victoria on 20 July 1899. This organization was also known as the Society to Protect the Emperor, or the Baohuanghui. Lee Folk Gay (Li Fuji) was the first president. Through constitutional reform, the CERA hoped that China could regain control over its own affairs and protect its overseas citizens from discrimination. One of the CERA’s early actions was to send birthday wishes via telegram to the Empress Dowager on 6 November 1899, stating: “Birthday congratulations. We request your abdication. Restore power of Quang Sui [sic] Emperor to whom our compliments.”

Fearing assassination, Kang moved to Coal Island, near Sidney. A Canadian policeman accompanied him in the daytime and he had two Chinese bodyguards at night. On this island, Kang planned a military campaign to free the Guangxu Emperor. Meanwhile, the CERA raised funds for the military action and sent members to China to fight, but the campaign failed in late 1900.

Despite this setback, the CERA continued to organize Chinese reform overseas. Chapters of the CERA sprang up in over 150 cities in the Americas, Africa, Australia and Asia. A women’s branch, the Chinese Empire Ladies reform Association, was formed in Victoria in 1903. By 1904, the CERA had chapters in 12 cities across Canada which had a total of about 7,000 members. The Victoria chapter initiated a corporation to develop transnational businesses such as banks in New York and Hong Kong and a streetcar company in Mexico. The CERA built a headquarters in Victoria in 1905, a building that still stands at 1715 Government Street.

The Victoria CERA remained active in Chinese political movements, for example leading a petition to the imperial government in China to convene a parliament in 1910. The conservative leadership in China rejected this petition, and this became one of the factors leading to the 1911 Revolution that brought down the Qing dynasty and the imperial system.

Initiated by a close advisor of the former Emperor, the Chinese Empire Reform Association in Victoria was the first of many chapters established worldwide. The Victoria chapter took a leadership role in advocating for reforms that were intended to help China and its overseas citizens survive and thrive in a period of rapid modernization.

The Chinese Empire Reform Association building was renovated from 2006-2011. These renovations revealed a stone tablet and a time capsule placed in the building a century before.

This stone tablet, which explains the background of the Chinese Empire Reform Association and provides a list of original donors, was found behind a boarded-up window during the recent renovations (Photo by Charles Yang, June 2011).

This is a badge worn by members of the Chinese Empire Reform Association, or in Chinese, Baohuanghui, meaning "The Society to Protect the Emperor." The badge includes the image of the Guangxu emperor, the imperial patron of a failed political reform in China in 1898. Above his image are the flag of the association (left) and the national flag of late Qing China (right). On the two sides of the emperor's image are the initials of the English title of the association and the Chinese phrase, "comrades of the Society to Protect the Emperor." It was one of the items placed into the time capsule of the association's new headquarters at 1715 Government Street in 1905 (Photo by Zhongping Chen).

Treasures from a time capsule of the reform association, 1905

A pearl brooch found in the time capsule (Photo by Zhongping Chen).

A bronze kylin or Chinese unicorn holding a book, one of the items located in the time capsule (Photo by Zhongping Chen).

A Jade Buddha from the time capsule (Photo by Zhongping Chen).

Sources

Chen, Zhongping. “City Played Key Role in Chinese Reform Movement.” Times Colonist, 24 June 2012.